Male-headed Families Research Articles

Risk preference and relative poverty: An analysis based on the data of China Family Panel Studies

It is posited that solving the problem of relative poverty (RP) first requires the identification of its cause. We use data from China Family Panel Studies to examine the impact of risk preference on RP of urban and rural families in China and the underlying mechanism. This paper contributes to the existing body of evidence on the determinants of RP. The results show that a high degree of risk preference is conducive to alleviating families' RP. The effect is still significant after dealing with potential endogeneity through instrumental variables. Furthermore, the effect is more obvious among health insurance participation families, endowment insurance participation families, families with low life satisfaction, non-poor families, especially middle-income families, urban families, male-headed families and families in the West in China. Further analysis suggests that risk preference affects RP by promoting entrepreneurship and credit in urban and rural families. Families with a higher risk preference are more likely to engage in entrepreneurship and utilize credit, which in turn helps alleviate their RP. Overall, this paper provides new empirical evidence for understanding the mechanism of risk preference influencing RP.

Identifying Gender-Specific Risk Factors for Income Poverty across Poverty Levels in Urban Mexico: A Model-Based Boosting Approach

This paper aims to identify income-poverty risk factors in urban Mexican households. Special emphasis is paid to examine differences between female- and male-headed families. To this, a dataset with 45 theoretical factors at the individual/household, community, and regional levels, integrating information from nine sources, is created. To these data, additive quantile models are estimated via the boosting algorithm. From a gender standpoint, the following main contributions come from this paper. First, educational lag is particularly relevant for female-headed households. Second, there is a gendered life cycle in the income trajectory for poor households with a head having a medium level of education. Third, some households, traditionally disregarded, are found to be even poorer: those lacking social connectedness, without credit cards, with an extended composition, in which the female head spends a large part of her time on housework, and families headed by young women with a medium level of education. Finally, communities and regions where families have a lower income-to-poverty ratio are characterized as having an unequal income distribution, lower human development, lower levels of women’s economic participation, poor quality of services, and lower gender-based violence levels in the public sphere but higher gender-based violence levels in the family context.

Traditional Seed Production and Processing Method for Urochloa Grass Employed by Farmers in the Adamawa Region of Cameroon

Aims: To investigate the traditional / local seed processing system employed by farmers in the Adamawa region, examine the practices and techniques used in seed production and processing.
 Study Design: A purposive random sampling technique was used.
 Place and Duration of Study: This study was carried out at seven localities (Ngaousai, Youkou, Wakwa, Darang, Mbidjoro, Beka and Bini) in Adamawa region, Vina division (Ngoundere) between September and October 2019
 Methodology: The research included a combination of phone calls interviews, focus group discussion (FGD) and use of semi-structured questionnaires. The views of 16 farmers were sampled focusing on socioeconomic characteristics, the benefits of Urochloa grass, perception of Urochloa grass and seeds production system as well as cost of production of Urochloa seeds. The economic return in terms of benefit/cost ratio was calculated taking into consideration the current prices of various inputs.
 Results: Male-headed families made up 81% of the respondents. Most of the respondents were within the productive ages of 31-40 years (31%) and 41-50 years (31%). Majority of respondents (75%) owned their farms and most of them (63%) have been farming for more than 10 years, with (44%) of them farming on areas between 5 and 10 hectares. 68.7% of the respondents get their seeds from past harvest. Most of the farmers (86.7%) harvest seeds using direct heading. Over all, the majority of respondents (81.25%) prepare their seeds by sun drying. In terms of economic value, results showed a Benefit: Cost ratio of more than 1.
 Conclusion: The study contributes to the preservation and dissemination of indigenous knowledge related to Urochloa seed processing method. Thereby reducing the dependence of importing seeds to enhance livestock production. These findings underscore the potential of Urochloa seed production as a profitable agricultural activity that can contribute to the economic well-being of farmers in the region.

Gender dimensions of climate change adaptation in Tigray, Ethiopia

The study of the impacts and drivers of climate change adaptation should consider gender (in)equality and women’s participation, as they both play pivotal roles. However, research on gender aspects of climate change adaptation has been limited. This study assesses gender dimensions of adaptation to climate change and determinants of smallholder farmers’ adaptation strategies in Adwa district, Tigray, Ethiopia. Drawing on household surveys, key informant interviews, and focus group discussions carried out in 2017, the study found that climate change had more severe impacts on female-headed households than on male-headed households. This was due to women’s lack of resource access and control, lack of income and technology use, and high dependence on natural resources. Major climate change adaptation measures identified in the study area included adjustment of planting dates, crop varieties, water harvesting practices, soil and water conservation, irrigation, seasonal migration, diversifying income sources, and agricultural inputs. Rates and extent of adaptation varied by gender. As indicated by multivariate probit analysis, major determinants of farmers’ adaptation choices included agro-ecology; gender, age, education, family size, farm size, non-farm income, livestock; access to information, extension services, and credit; and distance to market center. Study findings suggest that policymakers should consider differences between female- and male-headed families in their access to land, information, income, extension services, technologies, and other resources. By doing so, climate change adaptation practices may be broadened and sustainable development promoted.

An empirical investigation of the dynamic linkages of land access and food security: Evidence from Ethiopia using system GMM approach

In this work, we empirically investigate how land acquisition and food security interact dynamically in Ethiopia's rural and small-town areas. Apparently, connections between the two issues getting more attention, yet dynamic links between them remain unexplored. This paper utilizes a moment-based generalized systems approach (SYS-GMM), and tests in panel data models. The results of system GMM estimates using data for 3288 households from 2011–12 to 2018–19 confirm that the lagged dependent variables were negative (-1.359) with statistically significant, which justifies the specification of the dynamic panel model and the adoption of the two-step system-GMM for estimating DPD analysis, which further validates the dynamic adjustment process and the lagged effect. It also confirmed that adult equivalence (a proxy for family size, and tropical livestock unit all exhibit elastic relationships i.e., −3.101 and 1.23 respectively at a 1% level of significance, while the other statistically significant predictors were found to have an inelastic relationship with food security (<1). Here, the response of food security to changes in a household's total livestock assets, adult equivalence, and yearly food consumption per adult equivalence is quick, as a proportionate change in these variables would result in a higher proportionate change in the level of a household's food security. The study further revealed that families with female heads (FHHs) experience more food insecurity than households with male heads. FHHs, however, are 11% less likely than male-headed families to be food secure. The results are further confirmed using different diagnostic tests which include serial correlation and Sargan/Hansen tests. The results are further confirmed using different diagnostic tests which include serial correlation and Sargan/Hansen tests. The robustness of the GMM results was confirmed by the pooled OLS, difference GMM, and the fixed effect model results. To this end, interventions and policies should be adopted to decrease the food insecurity of households in the long run in Ethiopia.

Institutional Arrangements and Support Systems for Independent Smallholder Irrigators in the Msinga Local Municipality, South Africa

This article describes the present institutional arrangements for irrigators’ resource access, agricultural support systems accessible to irrigators, and the various constraints irrigators experience. The survey acquired data from 101 snowballed respondents for the quantitative phase of the study. The qualitative phase gathered information from four purposively selected focus group discussions. According to the findings, irrigators commonly gained access to production land through traditional authority (81.2%). Gender was a barrier to land access, where male-headed families had larger land sizes than female-headed ones (t=4.993, p=0.028). Concerning irrigation water, irrigators abstract it wherever they find access, without any institutional arrangement or restriction. The main limitations to irrigators’ water availability were competition and the drying out of the water source, particularly spring water. Government assistance was rare among independent irrigators. Smallholder support services tend to be distributed unevenly among South African smallholders, usually leaving independent irrigators unsupported. Lastly, irrigators experience constraints in their farming that government existing services have the potential to address. Therefore, this study proposes that the government recognize independent irrigators as possible drivers of poverty and food insecurities. The study recommends institutional inclusion and the extension of support systems to independent irrigators.

Status and determinants of saving behavior and intensity in pastoral and agro-pastoral communities of Afar regional state, Ethiopia.

Saving is a crucial tool for enhancing the livelihoods of pastoral and agro-pastoral communities, but due to a number of factors, its status and intensity are still in their infancy. Because of this, the current state of saving practices, their causes, and the size of pastoral and agro-pastoral communities are all examined in this study. A multi-stage sampling process was used to determine the 600 typical selected households. In order to assess the data, a double hurdle model was used. From the descriptive analysis result, only 35% of pastoral and agro-pastoral groups were savers. In comparison to their counterparts, households who have access to credit, are financially literate, engage in non-farm activities, cultivate crops in addition to livestock husbandry, use informal financial institutions, are educated, and wealthier are more likely to be savers and eager to save a larger amount of property. Households with more livestock and who live far away from formal financial institutions, on the other hand, are less likely to be savers and save only a small fraction of their income. Male-headed families are more likely to participate in saving decisions, whereas female-headed households must save more than their male counterparts once they have opted to save. Instead of relying on ineffective monetary policy (changing interest rates), any concerned bodies should emphasize mixed farming practices, establish financial institutions nearby to improve saving habits, provide non-farm training, and empower women in order to close the gap between savers and non-savers and mobilize resources to save and invest. Furthermore, raise awareness of financial institutions' products and services, as well as provide credit.

Impact of family structure and sociodemographic characteristics on parents headed families in Ramadi City, Iraq

Background: Several factors in the family profile contribute significantly to determining the effective policy when heading the family. This study aims to evaluate the sociodemographic and economic burdens on parents-headed families in Ramadi City, west of Iraq. Methods: A prospective cross-sectional household-based survey was conducted from 1st to 28th February 2019 among Iraqi people residents in Ramadi city, Anbar province. A multistage sampling technique was recruited to identify the eligible sample. A semi-structured questionnaire was used to interview (face-to-face) the respondents. Data from 267 households have undergone univariate and bivariate analyses. Multiple logistic regression, odds ratio (OR), and confidence intervals (CIs) were estimated to explore the predicting variables. The statistically significant is considered at less than 0.05. Results: The mean age of respondents was 43.88 (± 12.1) years (range: 25 to 69 years). Out of the total surveyed people, 52.8% were young (less than 44 years), male-headed families (59.6%), low educated level (65.5%), unemployed (52.4%), married (67.4%) and headed big families of seven members and above (43.1%). History of chronic diseases and smoking habits was positive among 46.4% and 45.7% of respondents, respectively. Findings of the binary logistic regressions showed that history of smoking (OR = 7.201, 95% CI: 3.254 to15.936), families of 7 members and above (OR = 6.239, 95% CI: 2.938 to 13.250), unhappy (OR = 5.237, 95% CI: 2.140 to 12.818), aged 44 years and above (OR = 3.518, 95% CI: 1.581 to 7.829), being single (unmarried, divorced, widow) (OR = 2.697, 95% CI: 1.230 to 5.914), and had a monthly income of less than USD400 (OR = 2.333, 95% CI: 1.112 to 4.859) are significantly associated with female-headed family. Conclusion: Priority must be given to some elements such as genetic, physical differences, biopsychosocial factors, and the economic situation when discussing parents' behavior in heading the family.

Do Rainfall Shocks Prompt Commercial Input Purchases Amongst Smallholder Farmers in Diverse Regions and Environments in Malawi?

The ability of farmers to acquire inputs through purchase from available markets empowers them with the autonomy and capacity to diversify inputs, consequently enhancing the resilience of their cropping activities to various shocks. This paper investigates whether climate shocks, particularly rainfall shocks, influence commercial input purchase decisions by smallholder farmers in contrasting geographic regions in Malawi, with a particular emphasis on fertilizer, agrochemicals, seed, and labor. The empirical approach integrates historical weather information, climate shock perceptions with a longitudinal household survey data set to model commercial input purchasing decisions using appropriate latent variable models. The findings suggest that exposure to recent rainfall shocks, especially droughts, stimulates commercial input purchasing across regions, especially in drier central and southern regions of Malawi. This result holds true for general input purchase decisions and for specific inputs such as agrochemicals, fertilizer, seed, and labor. Although drought shocks considerably increase the probability of acquiring inputs through purchase, they occasionally diminish the intensity of purchases. Both objective and subjective measures of lagged rainfall shocks are revealed as significant determinants of commercial input purchases across regions in Malawi. In addition to regional heterogeneity findings, further analysis shows that the relatively wealthier, male-headed families and those with access to information are more likely to invest in purchased inputs in response to drought shocks. Scaling up policies that remove demand- and supply-side barriers to smallholder farmers’ access to commercial inputs from available markets is necessary for adaptation to rainfall shocks.

Nexus Between Economic Development and Energy Poverty to Gain Energy Efficiency: Empirical Evidence From China

Mediating the nexus between economic development, energy poverty, and energy efficiency has become a major issue for governments. Evidence from China shows that both sectors have an important role in determining economic development policies and alleviating poverty. Economic development in China is examined experimentally in this research. This study makes use of the Data Envelopment Analysis and the entropy approach between 2007/08 and 2010/11 on the 17 provinces of china. For every unit increase in economic growth pressure, the development indicator of energy efficiency falls by 3.4 percent. Energy poverty and energy efficiency in China are strongly linked to economic development, according to the model’s economic development findings. Economic inequalities in China have increased as a result of greater economic development or China’s economic development to be of high quality, we believe that our results will be useful in understanding the function of national economic growth management and coordination in wealth distribution and energy use. For rural and male-headed families, the economic development is more consistent. Employees are most likely to be economic developmentt from an increase in economic development, which is expected to reduce energy poverty the most and improve energy efficiency the most.

Praying with One Eye Open: Mormons and Murder in Nineteenth-Century Appalachian Georgia

Praying with One Eye Open: Mormons and Murder in Nineteenth-Century Appalachian Georgia

Female family heads in fascist Italy: a study of the 1931 population census

ABSTRACT This article examines the characteristics of Italian families with a female family head in the Italian Population Census of 1931. The aim is to assess the spread and distribution of female-led families in Italy, and to analyze, in demographic and socio-economic terms, the characteristics of these families and the women who led them. Differences between these female-led families and those with male family heads are highlighted in terms of demographic characteristics, social status and geographical distribution. Female-family heads were mostly widows and were particularly numerous among the very rich and the very poor. As regards territorial distribution, female family heads were more numerous in the north and south than in the centre, and they were more common in cities than in the countryside. Many characteristics of these female-led families can be traced back hundreds of years.

Inclusive shelter provision in Mogadishu

This article is based on a research project led by the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) on shelter in East Africa. It explores Mogadishu’s history, political settlements and variations in housing to inform more inclusive, affordable shelter interventions. MAIN FINDINGS: • Connection between urban poverty and internal displacement. Mogadishu’s informal settlements are inhabited by people displaced from other regions and poor urban residents. As the urban poor live in areas with high tenure insecurity and can be evicted without notice, there are migration flows both into the city and within Mogadishu itself. • Role of informal networks and relations. As access to land and shelter is governed by a complex system of formal and informal rules, having contacts with powerful actors in the informal settlements is key to finding shelter. • Vulnerabilities of women, people with disabilities, and young single men. In Somalia’s patriarchal society, the male-headed family is the fundamental social unit; people who fall outside this category are heavily disadvantaged when accessing housing.

Early Social Security Claiming and Old-Age Poverty

Social Security faces a major financing shortfall. One policy option for addressing this shortfall would be to raise the earliest age at which individuals can claim their retirement benefits. A welfare analysis of such a policy change depends critically on how it affects living standards. This paper estimates the impact of the Social Security early entitlement age on later-life elderly living standards by tracing birth cohorts of men who had access to different potential claiming ages. The focus is on the Social Security Amendments of 1961, which introduced age 62 as the early entitlement age (EEA) for retired-worker benefits for men. Based on data from the Social Security Administration and March 1968-2001 Current Population Surveys, reductions in the EEA in the long-run lowered the average claiming age by 1.4 years, which lowered Social Security income for male-headed families in retirement by 1.5% at the mean, 3% at the median, and 4% at the 25th percentile of the Social Security income distribution. The increase in early claiming was associated with a decrease in total income, but only at the bottom of the income distribution. There was a large associated rise in elderly poverty and income inequality; the introduction of early claiming raised the elderly poverty rate by about one percentage point. Finally, for the 1885-1916 cohorts, the implied elasticity of poverty with respect to Social Security income for male-headed families is 1.6−. Overall, we find that the introduction of early claiming was associated with a reduction in income and an increase in the poverty rate in old age for male-headed households.

A cultural perspective on cooking patterns, energy transfer programmes and determinants of liquefied petroleum gas use in the Andean Peru

In 2012, the Peruvian government launched the public-private initiative for energy inclusion (FISE) to promote equitable access to subsidised liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) cylinders. The objective of this study was to explore cooking patterns, attitudes towards the FISE-programme, and factors influencing LPG use in rural Andean Peru. Forty-eight women from four communities completed a paper-based questionnaire on cooking practices and demographic characteristics. They partook in focus group discussions and participant observation sessions. In addition, we conducted 12 semi-structured, in-depth interviews with local authorities, FISE-programme contractor officials and male family heads. Despite the large outreach of the FISE-programme in the region, discrepancies in the administrative practices of public and private partners made it difficult for FISE-beneficiaries to obtain both LPG stoves and FISE-voucher discounts. The complications experienced by households not connected to the electricity grid may serve as an illustration of this lack of coordination. The FISE-programme inclusion criteria required a stable monthly electricity consumption of 30 kW-hours, thus excluding families with prepaid electricity meters living in remote areas. Overall, we found that the FISE-programme did not lead to exclusive LPG use in our setting. LPG was the second preferred source of cooking energy after firewood, and women only used LPG for preparing quick meals (e.g. soups) or for reheating meals. The main barriers limiting LPG use included purchasing costs; difficulties completing other daily chores while cooking; technologies not matching local cooking needs; the need to save time; and the perception that LPG affects the taste of food. Peruvian LPG programmes should harmonise their recruitment schemes, and the FISE-programme should modify its criteria to ensure the inclusion of all vulnerable populations. In view of the evidence obtained from other countries and the high prevalence of stove-stacking practices, LPG initiatives in rural Andean Peru merit from incorporating socio-cultural dimensions and alternative cooking technologies adapted to local fuel preferences, food cultures, and cooking demands in order to achieve a sustained LPG transition.

Post–World War II Tejano Farm Labor: A Remembrance

Post–World War II Tejano Farm Labor:A Remembrance Arnoldo De León (bio) Click for larger view View full resolution A map of South Texas showing notable locations for this article. [End Page 136] Recent historical monographs about post–World War II South Texas posit that due to Cold War-era modernization and industrialization, large and mechanized corporate entities able to buy the needed farm machinery and devices, pay irrigation costs, and invest in insect eradication products displaced small independent farmers who could not afford the investments required for healthy profits.1 Newer research detects in this era the rise of a powerful and politically influential conglomerate of agribusiness companies with a free hand to exploit a mass of transient Mexican farm workers.2 The corporate farming system that took root in the trans-Nueces River area, some of these latest tomes find, was as brutal in its oppression as other systems adopted by capitalist powers in the exploitation of their territorial dependents. Indeed, historian Tim Bowman likens South Texas [End Page 137] corporate bosses to European oppressors who established colonial societies in underdeveloped countries. He argues that this colonialism, first implanted in the Lower Rio Grande Valley by Anglo growers in the early twentieth century, remains in a modified form. Texas Mexicans faced a cold-hearted, merciless, and detached syndicate of growers in the 1950s and after who manipulated the sizable pool of braceros and mojados (the former legal workers from Mexico temporarily in the United States under contract and the latter in the country illegally, derisively called "wetbacks") to depress farm wages. John Weber, another scholar of Mexican American labor, writes that "South Texas growers devised a thoroughly modern set of practices that relied on forced mobility, enforced immobility, and an activist state not present in earlier times."3 Corporate farming, the literature indicates, consisted of a structured world undergirded by an army of mobile families. Migrant farm workers after World War II suffered grim poverty and grappled with precarious road travel. They agonized first over what means of transportation (many relied on troqueros, or truckers) would carry them through the harvest season. Then they faced uncertainties about work availability at the next destination. Distress beset male heads of families who concerned themselves with properly provisioning their wives and children and obtaining safe shelter for them; some of the labor camps along the migrant route offered barely livable conditions. There appeared no refuge for migrants upon returning to their home region. Most came back to struggle through the winter in substandard quarters until the seasonal cycle resumed. Children enrolled at run down and unkempt "Mexican schools" until the spring.4 Weber writes: The condition of Mexican and Mexican American farmworkers in South Texas changed little from the beginning of the farm boom in the 1910s until the post-Bracero era. From the beginning of large-scale migration from Mexico during the Revolution, Mexican and Mexican Americans were viewed by potential employers as a never-ending supply of labor power, more beasts of burden than citizens. This system was merely amplified over the next several decades, even as massive economic and political changes occurred in both nations.5 My remembrances of growing up on small farms in South Texas run counter to the conventional characterization given of labor structures in the history books. Certainly, corporate farming gained power and influence over labor in Texas after World War II, but to not to the extent of [End Page 138] being the sole system of agricultural order in the state. I contend as much based on memories of my youth in Nueces County,6 first at the Chap-man Ranch (1945–56) and then at the Jesse T. Parr farm in Robstown (1956–63), where an alternate labor structure prevailed. The Parr farm in particular stands out as a salient exception to what the scholarship says about the world of organized cropping after World War II, and so I draw attention to it as a viable agricultural model that persisted concomitantly with and complementary to commercial farming in that era. Small farming operations, commonly found in Nueces County and neighboring counties, consisted of a white property owner...

“Every Citizen a Sentinel! Every Home a Sentry Box!” The Sentinels of the Republic and the Gendered Origins of Free-Market Conservatism

In the 1920s and 1930s, the Sentinels of the Republic, a conservative citizens' organization, mounted a fierce campaign against the adoption of the federal Child Labor Amendment. The Sentinels were able to defeat the amendment by painting it as a threat to the sovereignty of the male-headed family. This appeal proved an effective rallying cry across sex, class, and faith lines, and galvanized significant opposition to the expansion of state power. Initially formed in 1922, the Sentinels, composed predominantly of elite businessmen, lawyers, and antifeminists, remained an active antistatist lobby throughout the following two decades, and formed a key part of the pro-business lobby that attacked the New Deal. Assessing the gendered political ideology and organizing strategies of the Sentinels reveals how patriarchal ideas about the traditional family played a core and constitutive role in the development of conservative free-market politics.

Migration decisions and destination choices

We used data collected from a face-to-face interview survey of 395 randomly selected farm households in Central Nepal’s Chitwan district to understand the migration decision-making processes and migration destination choices. This district was chosen because it represents the microcosm of whole Nepal due to the presence of migratory population from all over the country within the tropical and sub-tropical climatic districts. We used probit and multinomial logit regression models to discern the individual and family migration decision-making behaviors and to understand what determines the choice of migration destinations. Results suggested that migration decision-making is based on (a) the presence of a large number of young males in the family; (b) having fewer males with secondary education; (c) having more females with secondary education; and (d) higher household wealth. These ‘a–d’factors positively affect migration decision-making. Destination choice is generally dictated by individual characteristics and the economic potential of a destination site. Young, unmarried, male heads of families with a relatively large number of adult males but relatively low land holdings and wealth status choose Malaysia; older people from families with a fewer number of educated females and low land holdings choose India, and relatively less-educated females from families with less-educated heads of households but higher land holdings choose the Gulf Cooperation Council countries as their migration destination.

Can Children Have Ordinary Expectable Caregiving Environments in Unconventional Contexts? Quality of Care Organization in Three Mexican Same-Sex Planned Families.

The aim of this research was to explore the elements that configure the quality of care among three Mexican same-sex planned families: two female-parented families (through donor insemination) and a male-parented one (through adoption). The first family consisted of two mothers and a 3-year-old daughter; the second one had two mothers and a 1.5-year-old set of boy twins and the third family consisted of two fathers and a 2-year-old girl. It was assumed that Ainsworth’s notions of quality of care organization are useful in order to understand caregiver–child attachment relationships, regardless of the parents’ sexual orientation. A collective case study was selected due to the fact that these families shared their “unconventionality” (i.e., parents were not heterosexual) and the fact that they were planned, but each one constituted a particular case with a unique configuration. Four trained independent observers used the q-sort methodology (Maternal Behavior Q-Sort and Attachment Q-Sort) to describe parents’ and children’s behavior, respectively. The findings showed that parents were highly sensitive and all children used them as a secure base. To provide an in-depth examination of which elements configure the quality of care, a semi-structured interview with each parent was carried out. Through a thematic analysis, an over-arching theme named Affections and Emotions was identified, together with six subthemes: (1) Creating an affective environment; (2) Being available; (3) Acknowledging and expressing emotions; (4) Perceiving, interpreting and responding adequately to the child’s real self; (5) Taking the child’s perspective into account; and (6) Agreeing on roles and dividing the tasks. In order to showcase the particular configuration of gay parenting, the male-headed family narrative is reported in detail, because gay parents have been perceived as violating traditional gender roles as well as the hegemonic model of masculinity. The findings were consistent with the notion of quality of care as proposed by Ainsworth and her collaborators. The implications of the methodological device and research regarding same-sex planned families are discussed so as to understand the organization of the caregiving environment.

Factors Contributing to Gender Disparity in Education in Rural Areas: Evidence from Three Districts of Punjab, Pakistan

Education is an important human capital; and, it is the fundamental right of every human being irrespective of gender to acquire knowledge through education. Social scientists have highlighted the significance of female education without which socio-economic growth, especially in Asia, remains slow. However, gender disparity in education persists in rural peripherals of Pakistan, Afghanistan, Bhutan, India, Iran, Nepal and Bangladesh (UNESCO 2015). This deplorable situation is subject to multiple socio-economic and cultural barriers. In order to unveil these militating attributes, present investigation was conducted in three districts of the Punjab province in Pakistan from March to June 2016. The province is divided into three different zones: Northern, Central and Southern. From each zone, one district was purposively selected as the study area. From the selected districts (Sargodha, Khushab and Bhakhar), 100 rural households from each district were selected through multi-stage simple random sampling technique. The data were collected from 300 household heads and from their spouses through in-depth individual interviews to find out the difference in opinion of the male and female respondents. The collected data was analysed using SPSS. Paired t-test was used to find out the difference in responses of male and female respondents. In order to find out the difference in intensity of factors in the three districts, F-test was applied. Results showed that there is highly significant difference between age of male family heads and their spouses (wives) (χ2=50.121 and P&lt;0.05). Similar trend was found in educational status of male heads and their spouses. Cross tabulation indicated that educational status of wives was low as compared to their husbands. Analysis showed that a number of socio-economic factors are responsible for the existing gender disparity with reference to education in the study areas. Respondents identified low income, high educational expenditures, low educational level of parents (especially the mother), and security concerns of parents regarding sexual harassment as the major factors impeding female education. Results of the F-test showed that there exists difference in intensity of factors in the three study districts of Punjab which contribute towards gender disparity in education. Highest intensity (x =2.74/3.00) was found in district Bhakhar as it is a remote district of Punjab with higher poverty rate, followed by district Khushab and Sargodha. It is recommended that the Government at the national level should take serious steps in creating conducive environment to enhance female enrolment rate in rural localities.&#x0D;